HGBC News

Special Event: HGBC at the Houston Printing Museum

On Saturday, May 19th, come join us for a guided tour of Houston s Printing Museum, followed by lunch at the Dailey Review Cafe and a discussion of the Magna Carta.

11:30 am - 1 pm: Houston Printing Museum located 1324 West Clay, south of Allen Parkway & east of Waugh. The Museum charge of $5/per person for the guided tour will be paid by the Houston Great Books Council.

1 pm - 3 pm: Following the tour, we will head just down the street to a private room at the Daily Review Cafe for lunch (self-pay) and a discussion of the Magna Carta. The Cafe is located at 3412 West Lamar, just off Dunlavy (south of Allen Parkway).

Due to limited space RSVPs are advised; please respond to Ruth at: aitkeni1@netscape.net

HGBC Newsletter

"Great Reading", the new HGBC Newsletter is now available! It has been emailed to all HGBC members, but if you did not receive a copy, it can be seen here. The newsletter will be published quarterly, so watch your mailboxes!

MFAH Online Book Club

MFAH Online Book Club. Interested in carrying the enjoyment of your Great Books reading and discussion even further? Extend your discussion in conjunction with related art works through the Online Book Club at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. It's easy! Just pick one of the works featured, read and discuss it as usual in your group, then come as a group to the MFAH to continue your discussion. A gallery educator (docent) will accompany you to help facilitate a dialog between the literary artist you have read and several visual artists whose works relate to the book selected. Just go to www.mfah.org/bookclub, then to "Book Club Visits", and fill out the request form.

Currently featured offerings are Voices from the Other World: Ancient Egyptian Tales, by Naguib Mahfouz, and An Artist of the Floating World, by Kazuo Ishiguro.

The five short stories in Voices from the Other World: Ancient Egyptian Tales by Naguib Mahfouz (1911-2006), the only Egyptian writer awarded a Nobel Prize in Literature, provide glimpses of his homeland's past. Weaving together tales of political power with magical realism and memorable characters, Mahfouz evokes the memory of an ancient world in tales that read like contemporary fiction. Book Club tours will feature a wide range of works from the MFAH collections.

In Kazuo Ishiguro's (born 1956) An Artist of the Floating World, an aging artist is caught between two manifestations of Japan: the imperial movement that led his nation into World War II, and the devastation of postwar Nagasaki. Ishiguro's protagonist lives in a culture with strictly defined roles, and tries to reconcile "what is" with "what could be." Book Club tours will highlight works in the MFAH's highly anticipated new Arts of Japan Gallery, and expand into other areas of the museum's collections.

Tours related to Stacy Schiff's Cleopatra: A Life (a fall 2011 selection) have been extended through May 31, 2012.

Literacy Advance of Houston

A Great Books Discussion Group for adults working through an upper level English as a Second Language course meets at Literacy Advance of Houston, 2424 Wilcrest. We meet every Tuesday to express our ideas in English about the work we have read. In this way, we are increasing our knowledge of vocabulary and good writing as well as the relationship of literature to our common life.

30% of Houston adults cannot read. If you can read this, help someone who can't by contacting Frances Leland by email or Literacy Advance of Houston.